Fire! No...

We had a little excitement this morning - SPOILER ALERT - We're fine.

It's funny (not in the good way) how it all unfolded...

We were up, breakfast was on the stove, and we both registered a somewhat irritating noise. Well, we're on a busy street - I looked out the window and saw forklifts and construction vehicles moving around, and figured it was some sort of safety feature (like the common backing-up noise). We continued with what we were doing, but realized it was just not stopping! Finally, Rick checked the hall - it was louder there! Not construction at all! Fire alarm?!? Yes! Maybe? 

This is where it really gets worrisome - we called the Airbnb host 🙄. As we were speaking, I saw 3 firetrucks pull up. And stop. At our door! OK - it's serious 😳. We still took time getting out - turned off the stove, put on warmer clothes, grabbed computer and purse, coats and umbrella... Down the stairs (at least we remembered to do that)! The whole way down, I was thinking of what else I should have grabbed, and berating myself for taking too much time on other things.

At the bottom of the stairs, a fireman told us it was a false alarm - Rick went back upstairs (where his earplugs awaited), and I went outside for a while. They were working on getting the alarm and elevator reset, but said we could go back in (don't worry about any intermittent alarms).

Thinking about this now - I don't think the alarm would have awakened us, and we certainly didn't recognize it *as* an alarm. Even when we did, we didn't react properly. I'd like to think that if we had noticed smoke (for example), we would have done the correct thing...